Note: This post contains content that is meant to be whimsical. Any belittlement or trivialization of complex issues is only intended to lighten the mood and does not reflect upon the merit of those positions.

30% of the people responded, thus far, in this poll think that Brawler Mode is, in some form, reasonable. I believe that is enough people for it to be considered legitimate.

It is true that 10 people, especially since probably 5 of them are directly involved in the war, isn't a large sample. So I simply ask, how many people would have to vote in favor for it be legitimate in your eyes?

For a full mode? Probably not happening.

In my view, the best thing you could do is to make a full mech around this. We have a lot of mechs that use "basic" mechanics and setups. Having a couple of additional mechs that are "quirky" in the same way as the Redshift (AKA, very different mechanics when using the mech, creating a different playstyle entirely, as opposed to just starting with different weapons/stats) might be a really nice touch for the game. There actually aren't that many examples of this being done in the genre. And if said quirky mech ends up being the Azazel of the game (OP character from Isaac), then that's fine. Technically, the Redshift, when used properly, can become supremely OP already, because of it's special effect.

Considering that, right now, we're in the position of needing more mech ideas, that'd work out well.

There's a couple of additional ideas I have, relating to the creation of new mechs (which would involve adding more variety to a single mech, something that isn't done whatsoever right now, so that you have multiple options when using a "special" mech), but the detail of that is something to be saved for the emails (and I need to ponder it more first before I try to write any of it out).

Also that video was hilarious. Though I kept doing facepalms.

The biggest issue you have is.... you're using a damn keyboard. I can SEE the screwed up inputs with that. Though it's also that your movements are too wild. It's true that things are often designed specifically to get the player to panic, but zooming around wildly is a great way to be very dead very fast.

Your commentary is pretty good, though. Ever thought of doing more such videos of games? Though that IS time consuming.

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I guess I could weigh in here. The idea of regenerating health between rooms actually appeals to me a lot, but specifically for the hard and misery modes, since each room on its own feelslike a unique bullet hell challenge. Like, in normal mode I think things are fine as they are, but when higher difficulties mean the game is more bullet hell oriented and less rougelike, brawler mode sounds amazing.

I'd rather not change the rules between difficulty modes. I know that Hard mode is a pretty big step up from Normal, but... the way I've always described it is that Hard mode is for those that have utterly mastered normal. To the point where Normal isn't even doing much damage to them over the course of the run, even without defensive items. Misery mode just outright isn't finished, bah (or it would be dramatically more difficult). Wish that was different but there's been too many other priorities. I can finally get back to it now though.

I have occaisionally thought that maybe we need another difficulty mode between Normal and Hard, but.... uuuuugh, I don't even want to think of the process of actually implementing that.

At the very least, if brawler mode could be toggled, it'd make for some great practice in the higher difficulties, specifically first-hand experience in an actual room situation or to fight bosses with some kind of actual build that's beyond the test chamber capabilities. Like the idea of the cheat menu mentioned earlier, I suppose. But yeah, no overall rule changing; the game's current formula is too good to be modified.

I think the choices with Brawler mode are either as a full mech or as a cheat mode option that disables achievements. Interested in any of these, Ptarth? Or are you still pushing for a legitimate proper game mode with achievements enabled?

Personally, I'm pushing for it to be a cheat mode that disables achievements. Having it be a mech would make the achievements next to worthless and would make that mech the obvious choice for every difficulty since there is little challenege foe using it.

The forum format is not good for this type of discussion. There is no way to isolate and store progress on issues. I have responded to each of the claims in the other document.

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Note: This post contains content that is meant to be whimsical. Any belittlement or trivialization of complex issues is only intended to lighten the mood and does not reflect upon the merit of those positions.

The forum format is not good for this type of discussion. There is no way to isolate and store progress on issues. I have responded to each of the claims in the other document.

I dunno, frankly, it seems a hell of a lot better than that damn document. I spent TEN FREAKING MINUTES putting ONE sentence in there just now. It crashes and fails at a rate I've never seen before. I'm going back to emails again. It's a giant pain, but I think I've had enough of Google-related anything to last a thousand years. Even YouTube works better than that does. Their HQ should be filled with bees. Every cubic inch: Bees.

EDIT: Just when I thought that Google-related things had hit rock bottom, someone threw them a pile of nuclear jackhammers.

You cant even COPY FREAKING TEXT in there, a simplistic command handled by Windows most of the time, without downloading a "Special Google App " Which I'm guessing causes your machine to explode into a pile of rabid squirrels. Really, SOMEONE at Google (everyone?) needs to be on fire for having developed this entire thing.

I'll write up some answers to stuff in there in emails later today. Was going to do it right now. But Google happened. BEES, DAMMIT.

I'll reiterate what I said in the document: Adding the feature as an optional "cheat" that disables achievements gives no one any advantage. It just makes players who aren't very good at the game feel like they're better at the game, and thus more likely to play and recommend it. While the hardcore players might say its a stupid idea, they can always just not click the button. It wouldn't be a default feature, it would be an opt-in feature. If we add in the feature, we make a minority of people happy, and the majority of people just never touch it. This can possibly translate into more sales, and more popularity. Personally, I'd rather not piss off the little guys, since this was extremely easy to implement so far (All someone needs to do is add the actual health regen on room change or per tick).

I, personally, have no use for a brawler mod.As a cheat, I see no reason to object to a brawler mod.

An alternate solution may be to make health pickups scale up with the health multiplier. If you are taking more damage per room than you heal, being on Very Easy won't fix that at all- but if pickups healed 8x as much, perhaps it would.

On another note, is this "other document" a public thing that interested parties can view? If so, where can I find it?

An alternate solution may be to make health pickups scale up with the health multiplier. If you are taking more damage per room than you heal, being on Very Easy won't fix that at all- but if pickups healed 8x as much, perhaps it would.

For the latest internal build, Easy mode has a x2 multiplier on health pickups, Very Easy has a x3 multiplier. Plus, there is a perk at level 1 which can give you an additional x2 multiplier, if you are the sort of player who struggles with attrition.

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On another note, is this "other document" a public thing that interested parties can view? If so, where can I find it?

It's not public at the moment. Maybe we could make it public, I'm not sure, we'd have to discuss it. Things are a bit crazy on there at the moment, it mostly has our expansion plans, ideas, discussions etc.

It won't become a public document. It contains information that is not suitable for public release for a variety of typical reasons. We may share certain portions at various dates to survey people's thoughts and perspectives. Likewise, feel free to create or continue threads of your own. None of us are professionally competent in proper public relations procedures and so we have to take a conservative route for documentation access. We apologize if this is disappointing. Regardless, we will try to respond in a reasonable and sensible fashion.

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Note: This post contains content that is meant to be whimsical. Any belittlement or trivialization of complex issues is only intended to lighten the mood and does not reflect upon the merit of those positions.

It won't become a public document. It contains information that is not suitable for public release for a variety of typical reasons. We may share certain portions at various dates to survey people's thoughts and perspectives. Likewise, feel free to create or continue threads of your own. None of us are professionally competent in proper public relations procedures and so we have to take a conservative route for documentation access. We apologize if this is disappointing. Regardless, we will try to respond in a reasonable and sensible fashion.

Yep, can't make it public for a variety of reasons. If you have suggestions, we're definitely open to them.

Yep, can't make it public for a variety of reasons. If you have suggestions, we're definitely open to them.

Suggestion: If you guys decide to go with the cheat menu, could "dev-mode" and "everything unlock" be moved there? Seems like they would fit perfectly and it would clean up the interface a bit.

Also, if the achievements disabling is already in place, could you include a few basic cheats (infinite cash, infinite energy, etc) in that menu just for players to mess around with? I'm sure some players will have fun with that.

No worries about the document. I mostly didn't want to raise issues that had probably been discussed already.

I guess my big question about brawler mode, particularly if being relegated to a cheat is unsatisfactory, is why do you want it?Like, why health regeneration specifically over other things that make the game easier?

Yep, can't make it public for a variety of reasons. If you have suggestions, we're definitely open to them.

Suggestion: If you guys decide to go with the cheat menu, could "dev-mode" and "everything unlock" be moved there? Seems like they would fit perfectly and it would clean up the interface a bit.

Also, if the achievements disabling is already in place, could you include a few basic cheats (infinite cash, infinite energy, etc) in that menu just for players to mess around with? I'm sure some players will have fun with that.

DevMode and UnlockAll both are required to be set at the beginning of a run, and I don't think they can be set during the middle of a run. I can check, but I'm 90% sure it won't work.

I'll see what I can do for basic cheats.

Monkooky, I don't the answers the your questions, so I'll let ptarth (The guy who came up with it) answer. Just didn't want you to think you were being ignored.